Journal of an Apprentice
by ComPow
Summary: AU. Dipper ended up staying in Gravity Falls. Weirdmageddon did not happen and Bill is still out there. These are the adventures of Dipper as Ford's apprentice.


_Fall in Gravity Falls, it's a lot colder than in California and a lot more colorful too._

 _It's also two months into the beginning of school, unless you're me._

Two teens, one with blond hair and the other with a blue and white hat, ran through the streets of town. There was a large shadow cast over them as they tried to get away.

"We're going to die!" Screamed the girl.

 _My name is Dipper Pines. The girl freaking out is Pacifica Northwest._

 _You may be wondering what we're doing in the middle of town, escaping from yet another wondrous death machine of the forest._

A loud screech came from the monster and the two ran even faster.

"Do something Dipper!"

 _Rest assured, there's a perfectly logical explanation._

 **Gravity Falls**

 **Journal of an Apprentice**

 _Let's rewind._

 _I suppose it all began when Great Uncle Ford (the author of three journals with information on a large number of creatures that lived in this sleepy town) asked me to stay with him and become his apprentice since he was getting too old to go researching alone._

 _This got me into a fight with my sister, but in the end we made up and even left Gravity Falls together to spend a couple of weeks with our parents until Great Uncle Ford came to talk to them about what an opportunity it was for me to study under him._

 _In the end they agreed and I was back in Gravity Falls the next day._

"Hey kid, help me out will ya?" Grunkle Stan said while walking through the living room with a couple of groceries.

"Sure," I grumbled.

 _So far, Great Uncle Ford's apprenticeship had not even what I expected. He had told me about all the sorts of adventures we would be going on, but he never told me when. This last month and a half I had done nothing but study. I had been okay with it at first since I preferred to stay home back when I lived with my parents, but ever since last summer, I can't stay indoors like I could before._

Dipper grinned as he took a couple of bags from the trunk of Grunkle Stan's car.

 _Today's gonna be different. Since he won't take me anywhere, I'll just have to look for something myself._

With his mind made up, Dipper helped Grunkle Stan with the last of the bags.

"There," he sighed out after dropping a couple of bags on the kitchen table.

"Geez kid, it's no wonder you have noodle arms if that's enough to make you tired," Grunkle Stan said while sipping from a can of soda.

Dipper looked at him with a frown, "I'm not tired at all."

"Oh? Then I guess that means you can help me with a few things around the house."

The teen adjusted his hat, "Sorry Grunkle Stan, but I already have plans today."

"Oh no. You're not leaving until-"

"Bye!" Dipper exclaimed as he bolted out of the house, hearing his great uncle screaming in the background.

While the idea of doing him a favor would be considered good, Grunkle Stan was a conman who took advantage of the goodwill of people like him. He'd done it before, where he asked him for one favor and he ended up doing chores for a whole day. Well, that wouldn't happen today!

Dipper smiled eagerly and took out Journal 2.

He'd skimmed over Journal 1 and Journal 2 before, but in his exited state, didn't absorb a lot of information from them. At least he had a good idea of what to find in the journals, number two for instance was mostly filled with spells, but had some interesting creatures that he hadn't encountered before. The one that caught his attention was a small creature with thick fur, and a couple of small wings, something small and simple just to get back into the monster hunt spirit.

According to the journal, this creatures was likely found on a hill not too far from the Mystery Shack.

"Find the creature, take a picture, and then look for something else if I have the chance."

With that simple goal in mind, he continued on his way until he arrived at his destination a few minutes later.

The hill was surrounded by trees and tall bushes, though he could still spot multiple caves in it. Still, something fell _off_ about all this, for example, it had been a while since he saw any sort of forest creature, even the birds seemed to be flying around the hill instead of over it.

Strange indeed, but he came prepared.

Dark blue backpack filled with the essential survival tools. Flashlight, black light, a pocket knife, and a couple other essentials in case he got lost.

Dipper took out the flashlight and entered one of the caves, finding it to be quite roomy on the inside, not to mention deep.

He had to say that despite his experience with paranormal creatures, his heart still beat rapidly in his chest, and his whole body was tense in anticipation. With only the light from his flashlight, he couldn't get it out of his mind that there was something watching him and waiting to pounce. At least it wasn't hard to walk in the cave and there was practically no way for him to get lose as there weren't any diverging paths.

Eventually he made it into a large open area that had several beams of light coming from the many small openings above. He could also see the openings from what he guessed were the paths from the other caves he saw outside.

A grin spread across his face when he noticed that basking in one of the beams of light, was the small furry creature he had seen in the journal.

It was small, around the size of a melon, had silver fur, and its fur seemed to cover its whole body except for the two black dots on its face.

Well, it looked like he was almost done with his first monster hunt in a while. Now all he needed to to was take out the camera he had gotten as a gift from Ford, and snap a quick picture. He was a bit surprised when the creature squirmed and growled in discomfort when the flash of his camera went off.

"Sorry little guy, I should have known you wouldn't like that," Dipper apologized with a smile.

The creature's growls became louder and deeper, and it bared its tiny fangs. Dipper took a couple of steps back, heart pounding in his chest, when the creature shook uncontrollably and began to grow in size.

"C-Calm down boy."

It wasn't until the creature was about his own size, that Dipper called it quits and bolted off the cave. Things in Gravity Falls tended to get _really_ bad when something went wrong, and he wasn't about to stay and find out how bad it would get this time.

Running out of the cave didn't take too long, and just when he thought he was in the clear, a massive figure flew out of one of the caves and screeched loudly.

Dipper covered his ears and froze when his eyes met those of the creature.

He moved as fast as his legs could take him, and reached for the journal inside his vest. Careful not to step over a branch or something, he flipped through the pages until he finally found the page on the creature that he really should have researched further.

"The Mothhawk," he read out loud and skimmed through the page but found nothing useful.

But that wasn't all that was on the page, he noticed a large blank spot that surely had more information.

As he reached for his black light, he threw a glance back at the creature and jumped to the side as the creature swooped down in an attempt to catch him with its large talons.

Dipper quickly got back up and jumped through a couple of large bushes and found himself in the middle of a road. With no sense of direction, he blindly ran in the direction opposite of that of the moth, that was turning in the air.

With the brief free time, he took out the black light and used it on the journal, revealing a set of words that had not been there before, along with a drawing of the moth in its giant form.

" _Warning, do not shine bright lights on this creature. Doing so will only cause trouble,_ " Dipper sighed in exasperation. Great Uncle Ford should really stop leaving out important details until the end. " _It has a weakness. Because this creature hunts at night and nests inside caves, it is very sensitive to loud noises_."

Dipper grinned.

Now that he finally had something to go on, he could get to work in thinking of a solution. He put the journal and black light away as he continued to run. Luckily, he was headed straight into town.

After a few moments, he ran into town but there were almost no people outside.

He quickly checked his watch and found out why, it was only eleven in the morning, most people his age were in school, and the adults were either home or at work.

Great, just when he needed for there to be noise.

Dipper racked his brain for a solution as he ran on the sidewalk, sticking close to the buildings to dissuade the moth from swooping down again.

Lost in thought, he turned a corner and ended up running into someone and tumbling down as a result.

"Ow," he groaned, feeling a stinging pain in his left elbow.

"Dipper?"

He looked up from the ground and noticed that the person he had bumped into was Pacifica, who was also on the ground but didn't appear to be hurt.

"What are you doing here?"

"No time," he took her hand and began to run, "We have to get out of here."

"What? Why?"

Her question was answered when she heard a loud screech and looked back to see a giant disgusting creature flying after them.

"We're going to die!"

The monster screeched again, making them run even faster.

"Do something Dipper!"

Dipper gritted his teeth, brain moving a mile a minutes in an attempt to find something that might help them, until he finally recalled something.

It was during summer, on a night his sister had been telling him about a karaoke contest.

"Pacifica, you're good at singing right?"

She looked at him as if he'd gone crazy.

"Huh? What does that have to do with anything?!"

"This creature is sensitive to loud noises. If we can find something that amplifies sound, and you hit a high note, then we might get the creature to leave us alone...in theory."

"If you're sure it'll get rid of it then sure, I can do that."

Dipper nodded with a confident grin. There was the issue of finding something that amplified sound, but he luckily noticed a cop car not too far away.

"Alright Pacifica, we're going to split up real quick. There's an alley up ahead, hide there, while I get something to help us. On my count. One. Two..."

He looked back and quickly screamed, "Three!"

The two separated just as the creature swooped down once again, thankfully missing them both since it was going too fast to change its trajectory.

Dipper rushed to the cop car and opened the door, silently grateful that cops in Gravity Falls were not the brightest. He jumped in and looked through a large duffel bag until he found a megaphone.

He ran out of the car with the megaphone in hand, but was blindsided as the moth grabbed him by the backpack and pulled him up in the air.

"Dipper!"

"Pacifica hurry!" Dipper yelled as he threw the megaphone at her.

She caught the device and took in a deep breath. Turning on the megaphone, she let out the highest note she could muster.

The moth screeched loudly and dropped its hold on Dipper, to rush back to the woods.

With nothing holding him in the air anymore, he fell helplessly from several feet in the air.

Pacifica watched helplessly as he headed straight for the pavement, and couldn't help but close her eyes as he went closer and closer to the ground.

She expected to hear something, but there no sound of a body hitting the pavement. Confused and hopeful, she opened her eyes to see Dipper safely descending to the ground with the help of a sort of gun on his hand.

"Grappling hook..." Dipper smiled as he touched down on the sidewalk, and the hook retracted from where it was latched.

Pacifica rushed to his side, her expression filled with worry, "Are you okay?"

"Yup, I'm just fine."

"Good."

She then punched his shoulder, causing him to yelp in pain.

"That's for scaring me to death!"

He chuckled lightly, "Sorry about that, but there was no way to tell you that I would be fine."

She crossed her arms and looked away.

"But man, you can really hit a high note. My ears still hurt."

Pacifica smiled smugly, "Of course I can. I _am_ the best singer in Gravity Falls."

"You just might be," he said with a smile.

 **Linebreak**

Sitting at a table in Greasy's Diner, Dipper was writing on a notebook.

 _I had been having some doubts about deciding to stay in Gravity Falls. But there's still a lot more to see in this crazy place._

 _I still miss **her**..._

Pacifica returned from the restroom and sat across from him, her expression a bit disgusted.

"Gross. I'm never setting foot in a place like this again. The bathrooms smelled terrible."

 _But when you battle a massive moth monster side-by-side with someone, you realized that you're probably not as alone as you thought._

"Wait until you try the food," he said with a grin.

She looked at him oddly, "Are you trying to tell me the food here is so good that I'll want to come back?"

As a couple of trays of greasy food were placed on their tables, he chuckled.

"Quite the opposite actually."

Pacifica glared at him, "Why did you bring me here then?"

He shrugged, "It's the only place I could afford."

She huffed and took a sip of her water, "Next time I'm buying."

Dipper smiled, "Be my guest."


End file.
